Arianna Tinulla Milesi, "Sei un’oca", 2020.

Pencil and watercolor pastels on watercolor paper, 42x30 cm.

Arianna Tinulla Milesi is an artist and illustrator. She was born in Bergamo in 1982 and has lived in England since 2019. Her work consists mainly of drawing and interactive installations that create light and suspended atmospheres. Her preferred materials are paper, wood, threads, cloth and sometimes she includes living organisms as well. Her strong predilection for drawing has not limited the expansion of her interests, in fact her work is intertwined, on several levels, with music, literature, history and sciences. In recent years she has deepened knowledge of calligraphy and the practice and teaching of printing techniques including monotype and drypoint.

Women, even in Greek civilization, are relegated to the role of trophies: beautiful, intelligent, never independent. This is where my four drawings take inspiration from, two diptychs: "She's a cow", "You're a whale" and "Don't flirt" and "You're stupid". The first reveals the inconsistency of the negative male judgment on women who have an independent sex life, those who only to want to possess a women. The second work discusses the female taboo of body shape. The term "whale", a beautiful and majestic animal, is often associated with the shame of having a bigger body. The first part of the second diptych, on the other hand, makes fun of those who judge behaviour: the image of Athena symbolizes intelligence and clashes with that of the owl, which usually represents flirty and superficial behavior. The second work takes up the Caryatids' “sewing circle”. From the heads squawking geese come out, precious and beautiful, the same ones that saved Rome from the sacking of the Gauls. I want to give an ironic and orderly answer to male chauvinism, the rooted and structural enemy of Western society.

This artwork is part of the Viva la Vulva by Nuvenia project: a collective exhibition by international artists that aims to break down taboos linked to the female body in conjunction with an online charity auction in favor of the Italian Red Cross. The works will be on display at Six Gallery in Milan from 9 to 11 October.

"We are born free from taboos. We live in a society that forces them upon us, feeding stereotypes. Talking about them helps to break them down and learn to accept each other: because we are all perfect precisely because we are different".